Blue and other colours, part 2
Sunday, 7 July 2013 22:39![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aletheiafelineaOr Kate Griffin vs the rest of literature.
Part 1
A two-version entry. Jeśli wolisz czytać po polsku, tędy proszę.
Zone of medium spoiler hazard.
Kate Griffin, A Madness of Angels, The Midnight Mayor, The Neon Court, The Minority Council, Stray Souls
Quality...
Appearances are deceiving. Somehow it happens it’s the smallest common denominator of many things that can be said about Kate Griffin. She herself says that being classified as ‘young writer’ leads to quite awkward situations, like when on a convention one is seated on the panel for beginning authors, gets a chair between older people being very proud of their just published first book, and then one is asked about feelings that are somewhat forgotten after ten published own books… The species ‘young writer’, especially in the variety ‘too young for the full legal capacity’ (from what ensues a conclusion that publishing contract is a literary genre more demanding than novel), usually is a creature whose most distinct feature is being more visible than his/her book. Something like elephantine painting which basic advantage isn’t composition or chiaroscuro – and no one expects them anyway – but the fact that an elephant! hold the brush. In the long term it generates, hmm, the reverse stereotype: “how old? fifteen? I see… oh, not that I’m judging in advance, not at all, in theory it’s possible, of course, but…”. But if once in the million cases the theoretical possibility comes true and an author whose meetings with readers need to be coordinated with terms of school tests proves to be able to present something better than ‘fine for his/her age’, in such case youth stops being the main advantage and becomes the main obstacle. Something like at a good actress who is unlucky to be also beautiful. Griffin’s case exactly, in spite of that she’s an adult woman now, and the ‘young writer’ years ago was Catherine Webb, cause this was the name she published her first books under (Kate Griffin is a pen name). The sphere of fantasy publishers and readers regards her with a peculiar ambivalence: she is a permanent – after eleven years and thirteen books – beginner and still anew called a discovery, like a dinosaur bone thrice stirring up a sensation in three stock-takings of a museum’s magazine, and on the other hand she’s compared to Gaiman and Pratchett, prize nominations including (1, 2). As she says, she welcomed the third place not only with great joy due of being on the list at all, but also with relief that it was not higher, cause to beat own gods would be a horrible experience. Don’t know about you, but I agree with her.
So maybe I’ll quit at last this unfortunate perspective of ‘good author contrary to appearances’ and get down to facts… The facts are that Griffin has something to tell indeed, and it’s not “I’ve written a real book, wheee!!!” but “look, this fragment of reality deserves to be written about”. Again, don’t know about you, but personally I consider such approach one of the most essential features of a really good author. Of course, an idea is only the first step, and the thing is in the realisation. I must admit I hardly believe in any patronizingly patting-on-the-shoulder spiel of “just work, and possibly some day you’ll be writing great, even if now you produce an eye-crossing stuff for Internet sporkers’s fun, nothing is doomed yet”. With hard work one can, I suppose, achieve the correctness, but it’s not possible to deliberately get creativity, linguistic brilliance, and freshness of thought, just cause the core of these things is originality, which of definition can’t be imitated, can’t be learned. Every author develops, of course, but it’s noticeable that those really distinguishing have their own - own! - characteristic voice from the start and with time they became not at-last-acceptable but better and better (or worse, when aging, but that’s quite another story). Have you read Pratchett’s teenage texts? He already is recognisable in them, and one can see he began on the higher level than achieved by poor writers after years of work.
I haven’t read the first books of Catherine Webb, but probably I’ll check it even if only for curiosity if this phenomenon is noticeable also at her writing. I suspect so, cause Kate Griffin has her own characteristic ‘voice’ too. That is, I believe that literary style – same as line in drawing – is unique for any person just like handwriting and fingerprints, but some authors – and artists – have it strong enough to virtually work as the signature. Pratchett has one of strongest styles I know. Griffin, for my unprofessional but fanatically focusing on styles eye, has some strong (that is ‘own’) elements. It’s the matter of individual liking if her ‘voice’ is pleasant for reader or not, but personally I like it. Admittedly, one needs to take my fannish rose haze into consideration, but in my hazy rose opinion Griffin has a good pace of narration (weighing of ‘what, in which place, and how long’ is not so easy, and many otherwise enjoyable stylists fails here), interesting skill of ‘actional’ description (the specific ‘piling up’ way of depicting some culminating points is probably the most characteristic feature of her style; it’s one of things authors are loved or – depending on a reader – hated for; it’s also one of things used as a hook to hang a parody on), and above all the eye and ear of a keen observer (people, places, phenomenons, behaviours… noticing and apt noting down such things is Masters’ feature). Mixing it all, he happens to have a gloriously visual quill – Swift summoning the light in The Minority Council (and anything with light in general; possibly it’s her eye of a stage lighting technician, her other job); Mr Pinner spilling apart; the flight of Sally the Banshee chased by plastic bags; the painted ‘walking’ footprints…
There’s also maybe the least important but significant in practice advantage of a good author – literary literacy. This is probably the point – one can be a teenage writer and produce the million two hundred sixteenth high fantasy saga cause “I can do it too! and my saga is just the same, but it’s absolutely original cause it’s mine!”, or one can be a teenage writer who has read million two hundred fifteen already existing sagas and says “oh, come on, that’s enough, I see it quite different”. It helps if the second writer has read also anything other than high fantasy…
And, last but not least, Griffin knows her business.
Ei, no giggles, it’s a serious matter for a self-respecting professionalist. :) Nowadays, if you work in fantasy, you must dress your hero in a trench coat and wear black leather yourself. A few decades back it was just the other way.
…is the best when original, so...
Griffin’s books haven’t sprouted from bare ground, quite the contrary, they are all in loans and inspirations. (Not to be mistaken for intertextuality; it is there too, but little. Maybe it’s academic hair splitting, but I deem a mention about Star Trek for intertextuality, when a trench coat is rather a loan… which is already a distinguishing mark of urban fantasy anyway). However, her writing is the most interesting in places where clichés are reversed and broken.
The basic message of a self-respecting action stuff, being not just a merry demolition, but Merry Demolition in Defence of Values (so, every): the system is evil and oppresses individuality, and freedom shines like the morning star for non-conformist Free Spirit. Therefore, the Free Spirit has the unlimited credit for picturesque demolishing of buildings (windows in particular, especially shop ones), cars, bridges, old artworks, and official garb and property of any uniformed forces (so, the most points one earns for dumping a police-car full of starched and shiny policemen into a muddy slough). It means also figurative demolishing of traffic regulations, arresting procedures, acts about anything and statutes of whatever. The main rule is: if nothing has been devoted for the Superior Purpose (the accompaniment of panicking Formalists gets bonus points) then this Superior Purpose is not sacred sufficiently and you cannot see it's Superior. A reservation should be made that Superior Purpose may not be called so aloud, cause talking about Superior Purposes is reserved for Diabolical Villains; that's how we know they are diabolical, and that's how we can see which purposes are deceitfully superior. Now, the trouble is that if contesting regulations, windows and ancient ceramics works fine for a single plot, then after the tenth, six hundredth, and million forty thousand hundred seventeenth it becomes rather, ehm... programmatic? Man, how’s one supposed to contest rules if contestation itself is the rule... Really, Free Spirit's life is tough and in face of such existential uncertainty no wonder that a bottle of whisky (half-empty, as the secret code of pessimists) is an indispensable prop. And that's what Diabolical Villain is needed for – so the freedom of Free Spirit could be frowned on by someone, since the audience is the last willing to this role. And what's use of contestation if it doesn't bother anyone?
Griffin contests the contestation cliché itself, and that it's cliché indeed one can see from how surprisingly fresh is something written, um, maybe not as much against as little aslant to it. Freedom and individuality are still on 'our' side and in opposition to cowardly-greedy conformism and ideological blindness, but the entirety is more ambiguous, has more 'buts' and 'what ifs'. And even things being placed at 'our' side though they can hardly be considered traditionally hallowed ideas. But certainly they are feelings.
But first of all, the purpose of rules is not to be broken. It's possible, of course, go on, if you're a non-conformist, but it has its consequences. And it's not that some Big Brother's vengeful eye watches (in such case breaking a rule would be positive, as the act of resistance against oppression), but cause a broken rule is... well, broken. So it stops working. And since the most of rules' purpose, contrary to the popular belief, is making life easier, even if with some price, breaking them can be sawing the branch one’s sitting on. In such take, going contrary to regulations is not as much good or bad as rather suicidally stupid. The tree is the whole society.
The consequences can be very tangible in the universe where common beliefs influence the magic reality. The Tube barrier is an impassable border for everything without the ticket, so you can feel safe beyond it, nothing can reach you. Ei, but what if you jumped over it yourself, instead getting honestly through the gate? Since you're breaking the game rules, then... you're putting yourself out of their protection and it won't work anymore. That's why any valid statute is a spell. Maybe it doesn't sound as impressive as ancient incantations in the language of nothing but consonants (or vowels, if you're an elf) but it works. It does, if you doubt, try to persuade a ticket inspector that the article §265.XIV.13h does not oblige you, cause you haven't read it... What means by the way that Griffin's universe can lack Hogwart (though I wouldn't put beyond the Aldermen some schooling center with scholarship and integration programs), but still there's a lot of studying and memorizing. Theme for discussion: what's worse to memorize, nothing but consonants or a statute... And this in turn leads to the thought that there's some justice in it: looks like one can be a wizard, druid, warlock, shaman and whatever else inclination one has been born with, or not, the choice is yours, at the worst one ends as an amateur half-zard with the talent but without skill. The only exception are sorcerers who, as it seems, pay for the greatest power with the lack of choice – an uneducated sorcerer is a public menace walking, so he/she must become professional, want it or not. I'm leaving with this consolatory thought all who have tomorrow an exam of, say, six hundred pages of trade law. You have the sweet possibility of quitting it all to hell and get down to sweep streets. :)
Any else non-clichés? Sure, virtually a smorgasbord.
Car. Y'know, such metal box on four wheels, painted bright (or not so bright). Usually it's used to chasing, escaping, solving the plot's logistic problems like “witness' home is half a city from the crime's site, which is half a country from the place the culprit's fled to”, and – no less important – to being for the protagonist the cause of bills from the service (always when the current client is insolvent), bedroom, dining-room, the best friend and worst enemy, all at once. In general, it acts on rights of a part of anatomy – every character has two arms, two legs and two eyes by default, unless it's stated otherwise. In the same way everyone has a car, and if not, that's cause the car is temporarily under repair (a serious trouble and life's low point for the protagonist).
In Griffin's universe cars act on rights of buildings or extras, as the scenery element. They are shown from outside, usually in the herd form, as a crowded street and source of fumes. If a car is actually being used and plays a role in the plot, it usually is either a bus (so it counts for car only technically, due of having a petrol engine and driver, cause in the literary-cultural meaning it has 'busness', not 'carness') or it belongs to a secondary character and exists only for the given scene's needs. The main hero gets behind the wheel not before the fourth part, for a very short time, and says himself it's not his natural place. By the way, firearms exist in the Griffinversum in the same way – it's something that only others have and use, and not very often (what is not so important anyway in the reality where it's easier to use a fireball; the ammunition is cheaper and no need to care for shells later). Partially it reflects the difference between the American and European view of cars and weapon, but not only. The intensity of carlessness is exceptional in this case even comparing to the European average, the European urban fantasy including. It's significant if to take into consideration that Griffin's London is viewed from the sidewalk or bus window perspective. Distances are measured in hours of walk, number of bus stops and ticket prices, not in gallons of petrol.
Griffin's characters have personal life. It doesn't sound particularly original, but the thing is in the realisation again. Most often in the action-fantasy plots the role of personal life is played by romantic threads (or just sex scenes thrown in in the fanfic-like way: cause there was a free half an hour), but as I said before, this series is not paranormal romance. So much that it stands out even between the basically non-romantic fantasy-action stuff. Actually it's so much romance-less that the author felt it needs an explanation:
Looks like these days you need to explain yourself the most for the things that have sense... Not that any romantic side of life has been condemned, it's rather restored to the realistic proportions – it exists somewhere there in the background, together with other things that have their place after hours. Cause, by the way, one of the most genial elements of the Griffinversum is weaving in and 'translating' on the magic the city social spheres and subcultures: bikers, graffiti artists, NHS, and corporate culture. To thwart an apocalypse is a trifle, you need to write the report about it yet...
And the key word here is 'realism'. Privately I think that realism of details is what turns most fantastic confabulations into good literature, and vice versa – the lack of what will be the fail of the most 'important' plot. That's why I roll my eyes when hearing that a book is oh, so very lifelike cause it's about difficult matters! about cancer, adoption, alcoholism, war, finding God! ...unlike some rubbish about dragons. Nuh-uh, sorry, my dear, but if among that cancer and alcoholism characters make speeches in place of talking and play some dramas hanging in the emptiness in place of living, then it certainly is difficult – in reading – but not lifelike in the least. In turn, a dragon starving due of toothache is as lifelike as roadworks and bill for gas. Beyond the stage of main game – murderous monsters, mafia wars, armageddons queuing in line, just a day as every day – Griffin's characters have families, neighbours, play tennis, watch thrillers and read romance novels. And that's one of things that build the quality the most, but are irreducible in a summary, cause even a pickle sandwich and the interior of a bus can be described in such way it 'plays' fine or poor. I have no way to show it (a quote out of context not always makes the trick), so I can give only my word, admittedly a weak argument, for that the background of Griffin's writing is well done indeed.
By the way, among those all who have this developed background, the only exception seems to be Swift, paradoxically. The general impression is that life in the meaning broader than ice-cream and a bath is something he had when he... well, lived. In his former life.
Fantasy loves blood. The Griffinversum isn't so much of an exception in this point, the blood is magical too, significant for the plot and in the symbolic way. However, some reverse of the scheme is in the balance of accents. Usually blood is magic that may not be used; the intention to do it puts one on the dark side by default. The traditional context of the magic of blood is the hideouzzz vampiric desire and innocent victims ritually bleed down – cause the core of matter is seizing other's blood. But in the Griffinversum the walking incarnation of the magic of blood, Matthew Swift, is at the same time the victim who many would love to drain and the one making use of this power. The difference is that he uses own blood, not others'. Well, the main reason is that his blood is just the best stuff on the market...
This. The best. One of the typical plot patterns, especially in fantasy, is setting the character in such way that the reader discovers the given universe together with his/her. Convenient, cause at once one has the reason to the lecture on the universe's mechanics and earns point from critics for an “epic tale about the building of character”. Especially in cases when there's realised one of the most trite scenarios, that is: a young talent – usually eleven on the ten-degree scale from “magical abilities of a boiled potato” to “accidentally did something an old wizard had been trying to achieve from fifty years and at last said authoritatively it's not possible” – learns that he has the Gift and great deeds are fated to him. Then a long and difficult schooling begins – that's for it was epic enough – and we've got the Vol.1st done. The promised deeds you can put into next ones if the readers haven't given up yet, but some deeds should be stuffed also here and there in the course of said schooling. That's cause the important thing in this type of character is that he commits deeds incidentally, in spite of being chive-green in the job and totally ignorant toward the Powers He Attempts.
Griffin doesn't bother with this pattern, at least in A Madness of Angels. Matthew Swift enters the action not as a fresh talent discovering the magical lining of London, but a ready professionalist (though there's one interesting trick: Swift's human part is not green in the matters of magic, but the angelic part discovers the matters of human life. As for the magic, the motif of fresh discoverer comes later – Penny Ngwenya and Sharon Li, though only the latter plays the role of reader's POV). In this point Swift is in the similar situation as Carey's Felix Castor, yet they differ in another one, common for an average action and fantasy stuff: a small weak minnow vs big fishes. When Castor is and stays a minnow, usually drunk (yup, the secret code of pessimists), then Swift from the start is one of the biggest sharks in this ocean, if not the biggest one. And usually sober, something to consider for Castor... At the same time, Swift's position is quite ambiguous, cause he's at once disregarded as someone lacking the social signs of prestige (trampesse oblige, naturellement; one still needs to manifest somehow this non-conformism), and grudgingly respected as someone dangerous when pissed. Besides, Matthew Swift is quite a peculiarity from the literary point of view (from the fannish not at all, nooo... who I'm trying to cheat...), cause he does, thinks and says things so contradictory, that usually he'd be judged as a totally incoherent character. The trick is that he is deliberately construed on the base of this incoherency, but only if one knows it, one can detect its internal logic and consequence. Clever.
Such construction and position of the character ensues one problem though: how to avoid marysuisation? And where to get the suspense from, if it's obvious from the start that no one can beat Our Chap? The partial method for the first question is said deliberate incoherency – Swift's angelic part takes the all pathos upon itself; the human part in these moments probably looks somewhere else to avoid the suicide by facepalms... As for the other question, Griffin's way is putting problems that can't be solved by the victory of the mightier of two powers – such solution is in the first part, so it has been spend in a way, and in every next would be devaluated. Therefore in the following parts the suspense is moved onto the holding back of power one can achieve nothing with, and which can make more harm than help.
The victory begins to mean showing the weakness, and finally in Stray Souls everything depends again on small minnows.
…it begins to drop when...
Everything abovementioned explains why these books are attractive for me, though possibly for others they could be repelling for the same reasons. Nevertheless, there are some things even I consider weak points.
Once one gets used to expect from Griffin originality and fresh ideas at every step, it begins to annoy when somewhere an (over)used motif happens.
# The Aldermen’s political-and-financial dependency on the main villain in the given part, first in The Minority Council, then in Stray Souls. I hope this won’t be rehashed once more in The Glass God cause, by the way, it also begins to be trite and tiresome that the Aldermen as group are always more an obstacle than help so far. Instead one-two conspiratorial allies in the whole body ill-disposed toward Swift’s doings, how about one-two secret renegates? Even if for reasons like “cause that bastard over there was promoted, and I was not”.
# You can tell you’re visiting some sticks from different signs, but the obligatory thing is always a small-business with cheap calls to Zambia. Or Kenya. Or Ghana. Can I have some change? Dunno, maybe at least Nepal…
# Wendigo as a character is somewhat the copy of Mr Pinner. Not entirely, there’s lots of differences in details of appearance and personality, but it says something that they bring to mind each other at all and that you need to look for differences.
Here and there happen guns that have been hung on walls to fail shoot later. Or possibly I’m just blind.
# The trap on the railway station for San Khay is never used. Not that it’s not used for him – that’s just a plot point – but that it’s not used for anything, just disappears as the thread. And a thing that took a whole scene to make it ready lets one expect some return later, some use, some solution…
# Swift is not aware that in phone talks others hear him with a strange echo. He learns it when Penny tells him the effect had stopped. Why? Not why did it exist – the angels’ origin suffices for the explanation – but why did it stop? As one can guess, it’s supposed to be one of signs of the Blackout coming, but it lacks some logic connection.
# Why does Swift steal a jacket and jumper in The Minority Council? He needs them as the pretext to hide in a fitting room, but he could just put them away afterwards. Since he takes them, sparing some (precious in that moment) time for the manipulations with the alarm system at that, then I assume it has some purpose in the plot. But same as the circle in the station it appears and disappears with no use.
Not as much a weak point as my private undersatisfaction, but I long for some non-magic elements in the whole series that wouldn’t be only the remote background, the scenery for the plot. London in the Griffinversum is not an alternative London, some mirror world in an adjacent reality that has developed different than ours, but the real London, the ‘our’ one, just with the magical underground known only to, well, ones in the know. But those in the know are strangely numerous. Admittedly it’s obvious that an urban magic takes its place mostly between magicians, but if 99.9% characters met by chance turns out to have something in common with magic, you start to wonder where’s the whole rest not-in-the-know. I’d like to see some clash of said underground with someone/something – a character, an institution – unaware of the city magic’s existence, and I don’t mean extras like sellers in newsagents or bouncers in clubs. Such thread appeared only in The Midnight Mayor, but vanished soon, to never come back. Unless one counts Sharon Li, who suddenly gets going through walls as some troublesome ailment like epilepsy, but it’s just another case of someone discovering own magical inclinations, not a non-magician coming across the phenomenons totally strange to him/her.
…turns into a copy.
What distinguishes Griffin’s books is the freshness of approach and non-cliché-ness of ideas, so there’s something rotten in the matter, when it exhausts. Stray Souls are the try of refreshing the series by moving it onto new rails. The try is justifiable – even the best series can be worn out with repetition. However, ironically, the result has turned out the contrary to the plan, cause these other rails has been taken already... If the first four parts of the Urban Magic were the pure Griffin, then Stray Souls are almost by half Pratchett, not without a few droplets of other – unoriginal – additions. The action sewn together of chronologically parallel scenes with many characters of equal rank; generously applied humour based on using the common sense to cultural clichés; amiably presented characters construed on the clash of myth (vampire, zombie, banshee, troll etc.) with ‘lifelike’ problems (saving individuality in a tribal culture, social alienation due of appearance, allergy to magic), who in spite of individual weakness find the power in cooperation. And damn me if The Four Greatest Killers in the World are not of the same Guild as Mr Tulip & Mr Pin, Vandemar & Croup, Goss & Subby. Admittedly there should be said it’s a really fine made Pratchett, but the thing is we’ve got one already and nothing will be better than the original. Seems to me that “awesome fake!” is not very high on the list of most desired compliments... Replacing the original Griffin for a fake Pratchett is a questionable gain paid with the unquestionable loss. Beside of that, the novel is somewhat laboured, annoyingly recurrent within itself. A vampire with the serological conflict is a great idea. A vampire obsessed with hygiene is fun. But a vampire who rubs this obsession into your face in every second page wakes a desire to stake him at last. And what’s the worst, the entirety is like a not very pretty house assembled of the bricks taken from an old palace pulled down for this, cause elements one has become attached to in the previous parts are rather scattered here at random, than really put in their proper role. Looks like Swift’s main motivation suddenly is... the Aldermen's Christmas bonus. Yeah, I get the explanation that if Christmas is cancelled they can get pissed and change their boss for a better model, what for obvious technical reasons would end bad for the all involved, Swift including, but first, they keep trying it from the moment they appeared on the stage for the first time and it never really hampered Swift anyway, and second, in such case the oath ceremony in The Minority Council becomes nonsensical, if it has no consequences. The last thing seems to be defective also within the Stray Souls itself - for half of the book Swift gets the advertisement of almost the fifth element, and when he comes into the main action at last, he serves through the other half as the screen for displaying advantages of the new main hero. And in spite of that I love this side of Sharon Li in itself (at last – and it’s “at last” in the context of the all literature, fantasy in particular – some character says “enough of that enigmatic rubbish that I’m supposed to solve on my own! you want something from me, then talk clear!”), I don’t agree for building it at the previous characters’ expense. The competition “Who cringes sooner in front of the angry Sharon” becomes at last another motif worn in its ‘fun’. I like it the most yet at the vampire who said one sentence too much, relatively early then.
In general, as far as I’m concerned, Stray Souls is still a very good book, but in place of the Great Experience it’s barely the great fun. I hope there will be a higher concentration of the Griffiness in the previous style in The Glass God.
So, um, well... it’s The End, for now. Has someone survived to this place and wants to add something? :)
ETA
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Part 1
A two-version entry. Jeśli wolisz czytać po polsku, tędy proszę.
Zone of medium spoiler hazard.
Kate Griffin, A Madness of Angels, The Midnight Mayor, The Neon Court, The Minority Council, Stray Souls
Appearances are deceiving. Somehow it happens it’s the smallest common denominator of many things that can be said about Kate Griffin. She herself says that being classified as ‘young writer’ leads to quite awkward situations, like when on a convention one is seated on the panel for beginning authors, gets a chair between older people being very proud of their just published first book, and then one is asked about feelings that are somewhat forgotten after ten published own books… The species ‘young writer’, especially in the variety ‘too young for the full legal capacity’ (from what ensues a conclusion that publishing contract is a literary genre more demanding than novel), usually is a creature whose most distinct feature is being more visible than his/her book. Something like elephantine painting which basic advantage isn’t composition or chiaroscuro – and no one expects them anyway – but the fact that an elephant! hold the brush. In the long term it generates, hmm, the reverse stereotype: “how old? fifteen? I see… oh, not that I’m judging in advance, not at all, in theory it’s possible, of course, but…”. But if once in the million cases the theoretical possibility comes true and an author whose meetings with readers need to be coordinated with terms of school tests proves to be able to present something better than ‘fine for his/her age’, in such case youth stops being the main advantage and becomes the main obstacle. Something like at a good actress who is unlucky to be also beautiful. Griffin’s case exactly, in spite of that she’s an adult woman now, and the ‘young writer’ years ago was Catherine Webb, cause this was the name she published her first books under (Kate Griffin is a pen name). The sphere of fantasy publishers and readers regards her with a peculiar ambivalence: she is a permanent – after eleven years and thirteen books – beginner and still anew called a discovery, like a dinosaur bone thrice stirring up a sensation in three stock-takings of a museum’s magazine, and on the other hand she’s compared to Gaiman and Pratchett, prize nominations including (1, 2). As she says, she welcomed the third place not only with great joy due of being on the list at all, but also with relief that it was not higher, cause to beat own gods would be a horrible experience. Don’t know about you, but I agree with her.
So maybe I’ll quit at last this unfortunate perspective of ‘good author contrary to appearances’ and get down to facts… The facts are that Griffin has something to tell indeed, and it’s not “I’ve written a real book, wheee!!!” but “look, this fragment of reality deserves to be written about”. Again, don’t know about you, but personally I consider such approach one of the most essential features of a really good author. Of course, an idea is only the first step, and the thing is in the realisation. I must admit I hardly believe in any patronizingly patting-on-the-shoulder spiel of “just work, and possibly some day you’ll be writing great, even if now you produce an eye-crossing stuff for Internet sporkers’s fun, nothing is doomed yet”. With hard work one can, I suppose, achieve the correctness, but it’s not possible to deliberately get creativity, linguistic brilliance, and freshness of thought, just cause the core of these things is originality, which of definition can’t be imitated, can’t be learned. Every author develops, of course, but it’s noticeable that those really distinguishing have their own - own! - characteristic voice from the start and with time they became not at-last-acceptable but better and better (or worse, when aging, but that’s quite another story). Have you read Pratchett’s teenage texts? He already is recognisable in them, and one can see he began on the higher level than achieved by poor writers after years of work.
I haven’t read the first books of Catherine Webb, but probably I’ll check it even if only for curiosity if this phenomenon is noticeable also at her writing. I suspect so, cause Kate Griffin has her own characteristic ‘voice’ too. That is, I believe that literary style – same as line in drawing – is unique for any person just like handwriting and fingerprints, but some authors – and artists – have it strong enough to virtually work as the signature. Pratchett has one of strongest styles I know. Griffin, for my unprofessional but fanatically focusing on styles eye, has some strong (that is ‘own’) elements. It’s the matter of individual liking if her ‘voice’ is pleasant for reader or not, but personally I like it. Admittedly, one needs to take my fannish rose haze into consideration, but in my hazy rose opinion Griffin has a good pace of narration (weighing of ‘what, in which place, and how long’ is not so easy, and many otherwise enjoyable stylists fails here), interesting skill of ‘actional’ description (the specific ‘piling up’ way of depicting some culminating points is probably the most characteristic feature of her style; it’s one of things authors are loved or – depending on a reader – hated for; it’s also one of things used as a hook to hang a parody on), and above all the eye and ear of a keen observer (people, places, phenomenons, behaviours… noticing and apt noting down such things is Masters’ feature). Mixing it all, he happens to have a gloriously visual quill – Swift summoning the light in The Minority Council (and anything with light in general; possibly it’s her eye of a stage lighting technician, her other job); Mr Pinner spilling apart; the flight of Sally the Banshee chased by plastic bags; the painted ‘walking’ footprints…
There’s also maybe the least important but significant in practice advantage of a good author – literary literacy. This is probably the point – one can be a teenage writer and produce the million two hundred sixteenth high fantasy saga cause “I can do it too! and my saga is just the same, but it’s absolutely original cause it’s mine!”, or one can be a teenage writer who has read million two hundred fifteen already existing sagas and says “oh, come on, that’s enough, I see it quite different”. It helps if the second writer has read also anything other than high fantasy…
The forces of light, by definition, can’t go around beheading their enemies willy-nilly, whereas the forces of dark are perfectly content to butcher anyone who stands in their way and, well, you can’t shake the feeling this is a bit of a strategic problem.
…fear the evil wizard B’ob, and his dread minion, Al’fred, for by their apostrophes you instantly know that not only is this a magic kingdom, but its once where you can be fairly confident necromancers wear black and princes have an ancient power running in their blood…
I couldn’t stand the over-analysis of text – gods, but restoration comedy doesn’t stand up to the endless scrutiny we put it through, sometimes a farting joke is simply a farting joke.
And yeah, even if you haven’t read him [Chandler], you’ll have read someone trying to be him.
Yup, including Griffin herself. *g*
And, last but not least, Griffin knows her business.
I am a fantasy writer, and I know this because I own a black leather jacket.
Ei, no giggles, it’s a serious matter for a self-respecting professionalist. :) Nowadays, if you work in fantasy, you must dress your hero in a trench coat and wear black leather yourself. A few decades back it was just the other way.
Griffin’s books haven’t sprouted from bare ground, quite the contrary, they are all in loans and inspirations. (Not to be mistaken for intertextuality; it is there too, but little. Maybe it’s academic hair splitting, but I deem a mention about Star Trek for intertextuality, when a trench coat is rather a loan… which is already a distinguishing mark of urban fantasy anyway). However, her writing is the most interesting in places where clichés are reversed and broken.
The basic message of a self-respecting action stuff, being not just a merry demolition, but Merry Demolition in Defence of Values (so, every): the system is evil and oppresses individuality, and freedom shines like the morning star for non-conformist Free Spirit. Therefore, the Free Spirit has the unlimited credit for picturesque demolishing of buildings (windows in particular, especially shop ones), cars, bridges, old artworks, and official garb and property of any uniformed forces (so, the most points one earns for dumping a police-car full of starched and shiny policemen into a muddy slough). It means also figurative demolishing of traffic regulations, arresting procedures, acts about anything and statutes of whatever. The main rule is: if nothing has been devoted for the Superior Purpose (the accompaniment of panicking Formalists gets bonus points) then this Superior Purpose is not sacred sufficiently and you cannot see it's Superior. A reservation should be made that Superior Purpose may not be called so aloud, cause talking about Superior Purposes is reserved for Diabolical Villains; that's how we know they are diabolical, and that's how we can see which purposes are deceitfully superior. Now, the trouble is that if contesting regulations, windows and ancient ceramics works fine for a single plot, then after the tenth, six hundredth, and million forty thousand hundred seventeenth it becomes rather, ehm... programmatic? Man, how’s one supposed to contest rules if contestation itself is the rule... Really, Free Spirit's life is tough and in face of such existential uncertainty no wonder that a bottle of whisky (half-empty, as the secret code of pessimists) is an indispensable prop. And that's what Diabolical Villain is needed for – so the freedom of Free Spirit could be frowned on by someone, since the audience is the last willing to this role. And what's use of contestation if it doesn't bother anyone?
Griffin contests the contestation cliché itself, and that it's cliché indeed one can see from how surprisingly fresh is something written, um, maybe not as much against as little aslant to it. Freedom and individuality are still on 'our' side and in opposition to cowardly-greedy conformism and ideological blindness, but the entirety is more ambiguous, has more 'buts' and 'what ifs'. And even things being placed at 'our' side though they can hardly be considered traditionally hallowed ideas. But certainly they are feelings.
Spend enough time concentrating on the big picture and, sooner or later, you’ll forget about being human.
Vengeance is human. When one you care for dies, vengeance is what humans do. It is the human thing that must be done; it is what makes the difference between humans and everything else. It cannot be defended before the wise, it cannot be explained in a court of law, it will not stand before the theologians who believe in judgement day, but it is very human.
But first of all, the purpose of rules is not to be broken. It's possible, of course, go on, if you're a non-conformist, but it has its consequences. And it's not that some Big Brother's vengeful eye watches (in such case breaking a rule would be positive, as the act of resistance against oppression), but cause a broken rule is... well, broken. So it stops working. And since the most of rules' purpose, contrary to the popular belief, is making life easier, even if with some price, breaking them can be sawing the branch one’s sitting on. In such take, going contrary to regulations is not as much good or bad as rather suicidally stupid. The tree is the whole society.
We r proud 2 b difrent, but we jus end up da same. angry n violent, hatin every1 cos dey hate us til we cant remember who did da hatin 1st.
I mean, I get that you’re all busy summoning imps and enchanting elves and all that stuff, but you’re still going to use the NHS, aren’t you? You still want your rubbish collected, you still want your kids to have a decent place to go to school? Or are you just going to magic a stable job market and decent A-level grades into being?
The consequences can be very tangible in the universe where common beliefs influence the magic reality. The Tube barrier is an impassable border for everything without the ticket, so you can feel safe beyond it, nothing can reach you. Ei, but what if you jumped over it yourself, instead getting honestly through the gate? Since you're breaking the game rules, then... you're putting yourself out of their protection and it won't work anymore. That's why any valid statute is a spell. Maybe it doesn't sound as impressive as ancient incantations in the language of nothing but consonants (or vowels, if you're an elf) but it works. It does, if you doubt, try to persuade a ticket inspector that the article §265.XIV.13h does not oblige you, cause you haven't read it... What means by the way that Griffin's universe can lack Hogwart (though I wouldn't put beyond the Aldermen some schooling center with scholarship and integration programs), but still there's a lot of studying and memorizing. Theme for discussion: what's worse to memorize, nothing but consonants or a statute... And this in turn leads to the thought that there's some justice in it: looks like one can be a wizard, druid, warlock, shaman and whatever else inclination one has been born with, or not, the choice is yours, at the worst one ends as an amateur half-zard with the talent but without skill. The only exception are sorcerers who, as it seems, pay for the greatest power with the lack of choice – an uneducated sorcerer is a public menace walking, so he/she must become professional, want it or not. I'm leaving with this consolatory thought all who have tomorrow an exam of, say, six hundred pages of trade law. You have the sweet possibility of quitting it all to hell and get down to sweep streets. :)
Any else non-clichés? Sure, virtually a smorgasbord.
Car. Y'know, such metal box on four wheels, painted bright (or not so bright). Usually it's used to chasing, escaping, solving the plot's logistic problems like “witness' home is half a city from the crime's site, which is half a country from the place the culprit's fled to”, and – no less important – to being for the protagonist the cause of bills from the service (always when the current client is insolvent), bedroom, dining-room, the best friend and worst enemy, all at once. In general, it acts on rights of a part of anatomy – every character has two arms, two legs and two eyes by default, unless it's stated otherwise. In the same way everyone has a car, and if not, that's cause the car is temporarily under repair (a serious trouble and life's low point for the protagonist).
In Griffin's universe cars act on rights of buildings or extras, as the scenery element. They are shown from outside, usually in the herd form, as a crowded street and source of fumes. If a car is actually being used and plays a role in the plot, it usually is either a bus (so it counts for car only technically, due of having a petrol engine and driver, cause in the literary-cultural meaning it has 'busness', not 'carness') or it belongs to a secondary character and exists only for the given scene's needs. The main hero gets behind the wheel not before the fourth part, for a very short time, and says himself it's not his natural place. By the way, firearms exist in the Griffinversum in the same way – it's something that only others have and use, and not very often (what is not so important anyway in the reality where it's easier to use a fireball; the ammunition is cheaper and no need to care for shells later). Partially it reflects the difference between the American and European view of cars and weapon, but not only. The intensity of carlessness is exceptional in this case even comparing to the European average, the European urban fantasy including. It's significant if to take into consideration that Griffin's London is viewed from the sidewalk or bus window perspective. Distances are measured in hours of walk, number of bus stops and ticket prices, not in gallons of petrol.
Griffin's characters have personal life. It doesn't sound particularly original, but the thing is in the realisation again. Most often in the action-fantasy plots the role of personal life is played by romantic threads (or just sex scenes thrown in in the fanfic-like way: cause there was a free half an hour), but as I said before, this series is not paranormal romance. So much that it stands out even between the basically non-romantic fantasy-action stuff. Actually it's so much romance-less that the author felt it needs an explanation:
As readers of my works will probably have noticed, I don’t really do love interests. I’m perfectly happy doing sexual tension, and hints of Things Yet To Come, but generally speaking, I draw the line at actual snogging. Not because I’m adverse to it – not at all – but because the stories I tell tend to happen over a very tight period of time and frankly, I’m not convinced that the adventures I subject my characters to are really a sound basis for a relationship. Horror, terror, shared wonders and mutual disasters, sure, I can see how they might bring people together in a crisis, but frankly if these are your surrounding circumstances then you should really be far too busy dealing with the problem, than indulging in romance. ... Surely, but surely, when battling the forces of an oncoming darkness, the priority would be to get eight hours solid sleep, a decent breakfast and a really hot cup of tea?
Looks like these days you need to explain yourself the most for the things that have sense... Not that any romantic side of life has been condemned, it's rather restored to the realistic proportions – it exists somewhere there in the background, together with other things that have their place after hours. Cause, by the way, one of the most genial elements of the Griffinversum is weaving in and 'translating' on the magic the city social spheres and subcultures: bikers, graffiti artists, NHS, and corporate culture. To thwart an apocalypse is a trifle, you need to write the report about it yet...
Twenty-four hours after choosing this office, I arrived to find my presence announced by a nameplate on the door. Some two minutes and thirty seconds later, this plate was gone and I was finding a place to hide the screwdriver. Twenty-nine hours later it was back; eighty seconds after that it was gone, my skill with the screwdriver having improved.
Something to do with—and I apologise for the vagueness of the details—a creature of light and fire suddenly becoming manifest on the earth and attempting to rip the heavens into hell, unleash damnation upon the earth and so on; you know I really must talk to the scryers about finding more precise and less melodramatic language in their reports, it only encourages hysteria.
And the key word here is 'realism'. Privately I think that realism of details is what turns most fantastic confabulations into good literature, and vice versa – the lack of what will be the fail of the most 'important' plot. That's why I roll my eyes when hearing that a book is oh, so very lifelike cause it's about difficult matters! about cancer, adoption, alcoholism, war, finding God! ...unlike some rubbish about dragons. Nuh-uh, sorry, my dear, but if among that cancer and alcoholism characters make speeches in place of talking and play some dramas hanging in the emptiness in place of living, then it certainly is difficult – in reading – but not lifelike in the least. In turn, a dragon starving due of toothache is as lifelike as roadworks and bill for gas. Beyond the stage of main game – murderous monsters, mafia wars, armageddons queuing in line, just a day as every day – Griffin's characters have families, neighbours, play tennis, watch thrillers and read romance novels. And that's one of things that build the quality the most, but are irreducible in a summary, cause even a pickle sandwich and the interior of a bus can be described in such way it 'plays' fine or poor. I have no way to show it (a quote out of context not always makes the trick), so I can give only my word, admittedly a weak argument, for that the background of Griffin's writing is well done indeed.
By the way, among those all who have this developed background, the only exception seems to be Swift, paradoxically. The general impression is that life in the meaning broader than ice-cream and a bath is something he had when he... well, lived. In his former life.
Fantasy loves blood. The Griffinversum isn't so much of an exception in this point, the blood is magical too, significant for the plot and in the symbolic way. However, some reverse of the scheme is in the balance of accents. Usually blood is magic that may not be used; the intention to do it puts one on the dark side by default. The traditional context of the magic of blood is the hideouzzz vampiric desire and innocent victims ritually bleed down – cause the core of matter is seizing other's blood. But in the Griffinversum the walking incarnation of the magic of blood, Matthew Swift, is at the same time the victim who many would love to drain and the one making use of this power. The difference is that he uses own blood, not others'. Well, the main reason is that his blood is just the best stuff on the market...
This. The best. One of the typical plot patterns, especially in fantasy, is setting the character in such way that the reader discovers the given universe together with his/her. Convenient, cause at once one has the reason to the lecture on the universe's mechanics and earns point from critics for an “epic tale about the building of character”. Especially in cases when there's realised one of the most trite scenarios, that is: a young talent – usually eleven on the ten-degree scale from “magical abilities of a boiled potato” to “accidentally did something an old wizard had been trying to achieve from fifty years and at last said authoritatively it's not possible” – learns that he has the Gift and great deeds are fated to him. Then a long and difficult schooling begins – that's for it was epic enough – and we've got the Vol.1st done. The promised deeds you can put into next ones if the readers haven't given up yet, but some deeds should be stuffed also here and there in the course of said schooling. That's cause the important thing in this type of character is that he commits deeds incidentally, in spite of being chive-green in the job and totally ignorant toward the Powers He Attempts.
Griffin doesn't bother with this pattern, at least in A Madness of Angels. Matthew Swift enters the action not as a fresh talent discovering the magical lining of London, but a ready professionalist (though there's one interesting trick: Swift's human part is not green in the matters of magic, but the angelic part discovers the matters of human life. As for the magic, the motif of fresh discoverer comes later – Penny Ngwenya and Sharon Li, though only the latter plays the role of reader's POV). In this point Swift is in the similar situation as Carey's Felix Castor, yet they differ in another one, common for an average action and fantasy stuff: a small weak minnow vs big fishes. When Castor is and stays a minnow, usually drunk (yup, the secret code of pessimists), then Swift from the start is one of the biggest sharks in this ocean, if not the biggest one. And usually sober, something to consider for Castor... At the same time, Swift's position is quite ambiguous, cause he's at once disregarded as someone lacking the social signs of prestige (trampesse oblige, naturellement; one still needs to manifest somehow this non-conformism), and grudgingly respected as someone dangerous when pissed. Besides, Matthew Swift is quite a peculiarity from the literary point of view (from the fannish not at all, nooo... who I'm trying to cheat...), cause he does, thinks and says things so contradictory, that usually he'd be judged as a totally incoherent character. The trick is that he is deliberately construed on the base of this incoherency, but only if one knows it, one can detect its internal logic and consequence. Clever.
Such construction and position of the character ensues one problem though: how to avoid marysuisation? And where to get the suspense from, if it's obvious from the start that no one can beat Our Chap? The partial method for the first question is said deliberate incoherency – Swift's angelic part takes the all pathos upon itself; the human part in these moments probably looks somewhere else to avoid the suicide by facepalms... As for the other question, Griffin's way is putting problems that can't be solved by the victory of the mightier of two powers – such solution is in the first part, so it has been spend in a way, and in every next would be devaluated. Therefore in the following parts the suspense is moved onto the holding back of power one can achieve nothing with, and which can make more harm than help.
Stopping will be difficult – when you are strong, when you can revel in it. Being weak will be difficult. Choosing to be weak. Choosing when not to… choosing to be human will be difficult.
The victory begins to mean showing the weakness, and finally in Stray Souls everything depends again on small minnows.
Everything abovementioned explains why these books are attractive for me, though possibly for others they could be repelling for the same reasons. Nevertheless, there are some things even I consider weak points.
Once one gets used to expect from Griffin originality and fresh ideas at every step, it begins to annoy when somewhere an (over)used motif happens.
# The Aldermen’s political-and-financial dependency on the main villain in the given part, first in The Minority Council, then in Stray Souls. I hope this won’t be rehashed once more in The Glass God cause, by the way, it also begins to be trite and tiresome that the Aldermen as group are always more an obstacle than help so far. Instead one-two conspiratorial allies in the whole body ill-disposed toward Swift’s doings, how about one-two secret renegates? Even if for reasons like “cause that bastard over there was promoted, and I was not”.
# You can tell you’re visiting some sticks from different signs, but the obligatory thing is always a small-business with cheap calls to Zambia. Or Kenya. Or Ghana. Can I have some change? Dunno, maybe at least Nepal…
# Wendigo as a character is somewhat the copy of Mr Pinner. Not entirely, there’s lots of differences in details of appearance and personality, but it says something that they bring to mind each other at all and that you need to look for differences.
Here and there happen guns that have been hung on walls to fail shoot later. Or possibly I’m just blind.
# The trap on the railway station for San Khay is never used. Not that it’s not used for him – that’s just a plot point – but that it’s not used for anything, just disappears as the thread. And a thing that took a whole scene to make it ready lets one expect some return later, some use, some solution…
# Swift is not aware that in phone talks others hear him with a strange echo. He learns it when Penny tells him the effect had stopped. Why? Not why did it exist – the angels’ origin suffices for the explanation – but why did it stop? As one can guess, it’s supposed to be one of signs of the Blackout coming, but it lacks some logic connection.
# Why does Swift steal a jacket and jumper in The Minority Council? He needs them as the pretext to hide in a fitting room, but he could just put them away afterwards. Since he takes them, sparing some (precious in that moment) time for the manipulations with the alarm system at that, then I assume it has some purpose in the plot. But same as the circle in the station it appears and disappears with no use.
Not as much a weak point as my private undersatisfaction, but I long for some non-magic elements in the whole series that wouldn’t be only the remote background, the scenery for the plot. London in the Griffinversum is not an alternative London, some mirror world in an adjacent reality that has developed different than ours, but the real London, the ‘our’ one, just with the magical underground known only to, well, ones in the know. But those in the know are strangely numerous. Admittedly it’s obvious that an urban magic takes its place mostly between magicians, but if 99.9% characters met by chance turns out to have something in common with magic, you start to wonder where’s the whole rest not-in-the-know. I’d like to see some clash of said underground with someone/something – a character, an institution – unaware of the city magic’s existence, and I don’t mean extras like sellers in newsagents or bouncers in clubs. Such thread appeared only in The Midnight Mayor, but vanished soon, to never come back. Unless one counts Sharon Li, who suddenly gets going through walls as some troublesome ailment like epilepsy, but it’s just another case of someone discovering own magical inclinations, not a non-magician coming across the phenomenons totally strange to him/her.
What distinguishes Griffin’s books is the freshness of approach and non-cliché-ness of ideas, so there’s something rotten in the matter, when it exhausts. Stray Souls are the try of refreshing the series by moving it onto new rails. The try is justifiable – even the best series can be worn out with repetition. However, ironically, the result has turned out the contrary to the plan, cause these other rails has been taken already... If the first four parts of the Urban Magic were the pure Griffin, then Stray Souls are almost by half Pratchett, not without a few droplets of other – unoriginal – additions. The action sewn together of chronologically parallel scenes with many characters of equal rank; generously applied humour based on using the common sense to cultural clichés; amiably presented characters construed on the clash of myth (vampire, zombie, banshee, troll etc.) with ‘lifelike’ problems (saving individuality in a tribal culture, social alienation due of appearance, allergy to magic), who in spite of individual weakness find the power in cooperation. And damn me if The Four Greatest Killers in the World are not of the same Guild as Mr Tulip & Mr Pin, Vandemar & Croup, Goss & Subby. Admittedly there should be said it’s a really fine made Pratchett, but the thing is we’ve got one already and nothing will be better than the original. Seems to me that “awesome fake!” is not very high on the list of most desired compliments... Replacing the original Griffin for a fake Pratchett is a questionable gain paid with the unquestionable loss. Beside of that, the novel is somewhat laboured, annoyingly recurrent within itself. A vampire with the serological conflict is a great idea. A vampire obsessed with hygiene is fun. But a vampire who rubs this obsession into your face in every second page wakes a desire to stake him at last. And what’s the worst, the entirety is like a not very pretty house assembled of the bricks taken from an old palace pulled down for this, cause elements one has become attached to in the previous parts are rather scattered here at random, than really put in their proper role. Looks like Swift’s main motivation suddenly is... the Aldermen's Christmas bonus. Yeah, I get the explanation that if Christmas is cancelled they can get pissed and change their boss for a better model, what for obvious technical reasons would end bad for the all involved, Swift including, but first, they keep trying it from the moment they appeared on the stage for the first time and it never really hampered Swift anyway, and second, in such case the oath ceremony in The Minority Council becomes nonsensical, if it has no consequences. The last thing seems to be defective also within the Stray Souls itself - for half of the book Swift gets the advertisement of almost the fifth element, and when he comes into the main action at last, he serves through the other half as the screen for displaying advantages of the new main hero. And in spite of that I love this side of Sharon Li in itself (at last – and it’s “at last” in the context of the all literature, fantasy in particular – some character says “enough of that enigmatic rubbish that I’m supposed to solve on my own! you want something from me, then talk clear!”), I don’t agree for building it at the previous characters’ expense. The competition “Who cringes sooner in front of the angry Sharon” becomes at last another motif worn in its ‘fun’. I like it the most yet at the vampire who said one sentence too much, relatively early then.
In general, as far as I’m concerned, Stray Souls is still a very good book, but in place of the Great Experience it’s barely the great fun. I hope there will be a higher concentration of the Griffiness in the previous style in The Glass God.
So, um, well... it’s The End, for now. Has someone survived to this place and wants to add something? :)
ETA
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